According to The Irish Times, Ireland currently has 8,000 Opel Zafiras registered from 2005 to 2012 on the road – eight have been affected by the fault to date.

“Our investigations to date have found that a number of incidents have occurred due to previous repairs being performed improperly or using certain non-genuine parts,” the company said.

Concerned Zafira owners and those who notice any unusual characteristics with the heating and ventilation system, such as a squeaking noise from the dashboard, should contact their Opel dealer and arrange for the vehicle to be inspected.

“This will be done at no cost,” it said. “Opel will consider further actions as appropriate. For further information, customers should call Opel Customer Assistance on 01 5339818.”

Last week in the UK, Vauxhall – which the company is called there – told The Telegraph that it would not rule out a recall of the model once it had identified the “root cause”.